Oh wow, this makes me so nostalgic. The old days of Kpop! When it was actually good! And yes I realize basically everyone here disagrees and I don't care.

I didn't realize what had kept them away was the military service thing. It's always been so weird to me to hear about modern pop stars having to interrupt their careers for military service, it makes me think of Elvis in the late 50's. Although it seems like most Kpop boybands find ways to put it off until after the height of their career.

Oh wow, this makes me so nostalgic. The old days of Kpop! When it was actually good! And yes I realize basically everyone here disagrees and I don't care.

Nah, I agree completely.

I didn't realize what had kept them away was the military service thing. It's always been so weird to me to hear about modern pop stars having to interrupt their careers for military service, it makes me think of Elvis in the late 50's. Although it seems like most Kpop boybands find ways to put it off until after the height of their career.

I'm totally not clear about it, but I think boys do their military service for 2 years, any time between ages 18-30 (?).

ANYWAYS, ARE ME AND TNB THE ONLY PEOPLE THAT REMEMBER KPOP'S GOOD OLD DAYS?! It's really depressing reading some of these youtube comments on thsese videos. Like people only looked up Shinhwa because some newer group covered their song. MAN, ARE THESE SONGS SO OLD and UNKNOWN now? Too bad, SES and HOT won't ever form again.

I really like this performance of Yo! Just pretend it's not totally lip synced. They look so bad ass.

Oh, I remember those days, but I've never been a fan of boy groups. I know Shinhwa was pretty much the top of the KPop food chain, though -- sort of the SMAP of Korea. But yeah, I'd see them on Video Music Heaven all the time, which is when I'd say, "Goddammit! Play the new Baby VOX song already!"

I really like old school and new school KPop, honestly. The stuff from the late 90s and early 2000s was less original while having a more uniquely Korean flavor, but the new stuff is actually driving contemporary pop music to a small extent. To me a good song is a good song, but I guess I can see why some might like one over era the other.

I agree that the modern K-pop is driving music, but it feels much more like it was produced by a corporation and lacks feelings? Not worded the best, but.. yeah. I also think the older K-pop is less original on the whole. But if you take a look at this H.O.T. video, it is a FAR CRY of what K-pop would do today. It's got awesome guitars, orchestra, and epicness. But just excuse annoying fan girls, it was their last performance before disbanding and one of the members was badly injured and decided he had to perform anyways.

I'd love to talk about the girl groups like FinkL, SES, and Baby VOX, but it seems there's no possibility of them ever coming back.

I don't think any of those groups could hang given the current requirements to be a KPop idol. They are neither strong enough singers or dancers. There's a reason those groups lip synched nearly all of their appearances back then. I say this as a massive Baby VOX fan, too.

I will say this, though. Baby VOX had a four album run of excellence that very few pop acts can match. They are still the gold standard of Korean girl-pop as far as I'm concerned. None of the current groups -- some of whom I really like -- have released consistently great songs for longer than a year before falling into the ordinary.

I agree that the modern K-pop is driving music, but it feels much more like it was produced by a corporation and lacks feelings? Not worded the best, but.. yeah. I also think the older K-pop is less original on the whole. But if you take a look at this H.O.T. video, it is a FAR CRY of what K-pop would do today. It's got awesome guitars, orchestra, and epicness.

So much agreement with the first statement, that's a good way of concisely saying what I'd like to say. While its hard for me to really say that Kpop back then was less original, since modern Kpop is equally less original in the way it copies American music (at least the big hit singles) but even though the old stuff may have also sounded like random 90's American music, it had a ton more feeling to it, which, in my opinion can give any song, no matter how much it sounds like any other song, a whole new level of depth and originality. See: Blues music.

I don't think any of those groups could hang given the current requirements to be a KPop idol. They are neither strong enough singers or dancers. There's a reason those groups lip synched nearly all of their appearances back then. I say this as a massive Baby VOX fan, too.

I will say this, though. Baby VOX had a four album run of excellence that very few pop acts can match. They are still the gold standard of Korean girl-pop as far as I'm concerned. None of the current groups -- some of whom I really like -- have released consistently great songs for longer than a year before falling into the ordinary.

Yeah, the modern requirements of being a Kpop idol means doing anything possible to look and sound as much like a robot doll or a military troop as possible, including plastic surgery, rehearsals to the point of bad health, and treating everyone else in your group like shit. These seem to be the big "things" right now in Kpop, whereas the old groups had feeling to them, even if they weren't jumping around like they were running hurdles in the Olympics.

Though I'm not the biggest Baby VOX fan (I do like them,) I feel the exact same way about a few of the other early 2000's Kpop groups/artists where they just had absolutely awesome runs of 3-4 albums that are unrivalled. Also feel the same about the current industry, none of the artists now can manage to stay consistent at all. The good songs are scattered about 5 or 6 albums and mini-albums that were released in a 2-year span.

Baby VOX was awesome because they got awesome songs to record, but they were middling singers and dancers at best. They got the best songs to sing because they had far less to competition relative to the KPop market that existed at the time. They were the great white shark in a small pond that has since grown into a rather large lake with a lot more competition.

Another dance track and it's sooooooooooooooooooooooo much better than Venus and I was already cray about that. The music and the PV are really well produced. Remember people, they are like one of the few idol groups that actually have creative control over their releases.

Anyways, it has some influences from Psy - they used the same director as Gangnam Style and Gentlemen (but they've used him before in 2006). The dance might be similar in some ways, but overall the gay factor is like 1000%. That's OK MINWOO SHAKE YOUR CROTCH AT ME ANY DAY.

I didn't think anyone would care about my Shinhwa posts just like no one cares about my Cpop posts.

I recently started watching Shinhwa's variety show "Shinhwa Broadcast" and it's seriously looooooools. It doesn't require you to like the group at all. And it's idol torture at its best.

To summarize -

Episode 1/2 - Shinhwa is tasked with saving the president's daughter. This involves a varied number of tasks including
- Fighting desperately to be the one that gets to sit on the one cushion for 3 seconds (kind of like Musical Chairs except there's 1 chair) to the point that they're jump kicking each other
- Being dressed as super heroes (Tarzan, Invisible Man, Wonder Woman including the WHIP etc.) and playing rock, paper, scissors with the public who are running as fast as they can at the sight of some super crazy looking people

- Answering quiz questions which if answered wrong result in them being thrown in a swimming pool whilst wearing their super hero outfits.

Wonder Woman Minwoo was super adorable. Unfortunately it goes with his short height However, him and the whip was like. .

I recently started watching Shinhwa's variety show "Shinhwa Broadcast" and it's seriously looooooools. It doesn't require you to like the group at all. And it's idol torture at its best. (...)You can watch all the episodes SUBTITLED conveniently at DramaCrazy.

Berry made me watch it and tbh it beats the crap out of 99% Hello! Morning. I think only a few best H!M episodes were near this level of entertainment. Shinhwa Broadcast is really more like the best of H!M times the best of Utaban on steroids. Give it a go peoples and you won't be disappointed.

And that's with me knowing nothing about Shinhwa guys and being skeptical about boybands and K-pop in general to begin with. I really wish MM had a show of this level which could be watched purely for its entertainment value even without knowing the girls.

It's not bad at all, although I wish the chorus were more developed. It just sounds unfinished.

I didn't see your post. Thanks for commenting!

I agree the chorus is a little lacking since it's 'We live for this love' over and over again. But the synths there are enough to compensate it for me.

Shinhwa has been winning a lot of awards for This Love.

I'm really glad they're having a successful comeback considering all other first gen K-pop idols are all gone. The music industry has changed so much since their time with so many competitors and I'm sure there was a lot of doubt if they would be successful. Of course they didn't sell out and do what was popular, but they did something that was still their style while adapting to the times. And I'm feeling this is hitting the perfect medium for me. And I really honestly feel they are better than ever which is unusual for a group that's been around 15 years. And I think that has to do with them having control over their creativity. This has only happened in the 2 albums and the last 2 albums have been my favorite.

And I went on and on about their variety show a couple posts above called Shinhwa Broadcast. I'm realllllllly finding it awesome. And I think it again has to do with them having been together 15 years. They have really good chemstry. They're really honest with each other. I feel this also probably contributes to them having a successful comeback,

I bought their 11th album The Classic. The album in which This Love is the lead single for.

And I was lucky enough to get a limited edition that sold out on pre-order date!

And that's the story. My edition actually came in very poor condition although the pictures don't show it. I would have complained and returned it if I could, but since it's sold out everywhere there's not a lot I can do.

The ink from the photobook got on the inside of the box. My tin box looked like someone dropped it.

In addition to that, it got inspected by customs. It was shrink wrapped, but they opened it. I'm not sure that's normal procedure, but I'm pretty pissed off some custom officers with his grimey fingers touched my limited edition, sold out, no longer in print SHINHWA ALBUM.

Shinhwa and one of their awards they won. So cute. And funny. How can anyone deny how awesome they are?

Well, my wife has officially become into Shinhwa. I asked if she had heard their comeback single a while back, and she was all like, "Shinhwa? Pfft! Geezers..." Then she saw the Attack On Titan themed fan video that uses the music and video of "This Love" this morning, and she hasn't stopped listening to it all day. All. Fucking. Day. She is currently recording her own version of it.

Well, my wife has officially become into Shinhwa. I asked if she had heard their comeback single a while back, and she was all like, "Shinhwa? Pfft! Geezers..." Then she saw the Attack On Titan themed fan video that uses the music and video of "This Love" this morning, and she hasn't stopped listening to it all day. All. Fucking. Day. She is currently recording her own version of it.

That's how I found them! Except I saw the video with the cosplayers first and the short animation later.

Another dance track and it's sooooooooooooooooooooooo much better than Venus and I was already cray about that. The music and the PV are really well produced. Remember people, they are like one of the few idol groups that actually have creative control over their releases.

Anyways, it has some influences from Psy - they used the same director as Gangnam Style and Gentlemen (but they've used him before in 2006). The dance might be similar in some ways, but overall the gay factor is like 1000%. That's OK MINWOO SHAKE YOUR CROTCH AT ME ANY DAY.

Watch it people! For the song at least!

I've only watched the dance shot (repeatedly), but cosplay Levi did Minwoo's part so I focused on him most of the time and I agree wholeheartedly.

Just kidding, it's actually pretty good. I like it. The whistling makes me think of Morricone's soundtracks for the Man with No Name films. And H!P could only wish they could have MVs even a fraction as good.